Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to hose reel deck box and, more specifically, to a housing stiffener for a hose reel deck box.
Description of the Related Art
A hose reel deck box is a housing assembly supporting a hose reel. The hose reel includes a barrel about which a hose is wrapped, typically by turning a hand crank coupled to the barrel. The crank may be coupled directly to the barrel or indirectly coupled via one or more gears. The crank is, however, typically mounted on, and rotatably coupled to, the housing assembly. The hose may be full, or partially full, of water, or, empty as it is wound about the barrel. Regardless of the state of the hose, the weight hose creates torque on the housing assembly whenever the hose is wound up. Given a typical hose reel with generally square cross-section housing, the winding forces typically cause such a housing assembly to distort or “skew” into a non-rectangular parallelogram (diamond shape cross-section).
The housing assembly must be structured to resist the torque and other stresses applied thereto during the winding process. This may be accomplished by several known configurations. First, the housing assembly may be made from robust materials, typically metals. Such metal housing assemblies are expensive due to both material costs and assembly time. Second, plastic housing assemblies are typically less expensive than metal housings, but require extensive support structures, e.g. molded ribs and braces, in order to resist the forces applied thereto. The forming of such support structures typically requires the sides of the housing assemblies to be formed separately and assembled. Moreover, as the sides are not identical, i.e. the sides that support the barrel are often mirror images, multiple molds are required. As such, the time and cost to produce and assemble a plastic housing is also more than is desirable. Third, the housing may be a combination of metal and plastic components, but these housing assemblies may include the disadvantages rather than the advantages of both materials.
The housing assembly must further provide for a number of functions or accomplish desired tasks. For example, the housing assembly must provide mountings for various components such as the crank, the housing assembly must protect, and/or hide from view, the hose reel, and the housing assembly must be aesthetically pleasing to the user. Further, the housing assembly must resist the stresses caused by the winding forces noted above. This is typically accomplished by molding ribs and trusses, e.g. X-shaped ribs, into the sidewalls, especially along the edges of the sidewalls. Further, the hose reel deck box must be economical.
To reduce the cost of plastic hosing assemblies, manufacturers have attempted to create housing assemblies consisting of as few pieces as possible. Cost reductions in the manufacturing process can be implemented by reducing the number of separate components and the time/effort required to assemble such various components. For example, it is typically less expensive to mold a mounting for a crank into a housing assembly sidewall than it is manufacture the mounting separately and couple it to the housing assembly sidewall. In theory, the assembly cost could be reduced to, essentially, zero if the housing assembly were a single molded piece. This reduction in cost must, however, be balanced against the cost of the mold and the manufacturing costs associated with complex mold, e.g. a higher failure rate. That is, complex shapes, such as a crank mounting, must be incorporated into the mold and must be constructed in such a way that the molds may be separated and the molded product may be separated from the molds. Further, the cavity in the mold used to create complex shapes may be difficult to fill with liquid plastic during the injection process resulting in the increased failure rate noted above.
Presently, it is known to mold a housing assembly wherein the four vertical sidewalls are a unitary piece. A top sidewall, and possibly a bottom sidewall, are added to complete the housing assembly enclosure. Alternately, the top sidewall may be included in the mold. That is, the sides, and possibly the top, of the housing assembly are molded as a “unitary housing.” The sidewalls include mounts for the crank, the hose reel, and other components. Such features are formed as contoured surfaces of the sidewall. Typically, very few additional components are added to the unitary housing.
While use of a unitary housing component reduces the assembly time, the unitary housing is difficult to mold, especially in light of the fact that housing must resist most of the winding forces. Further, such unitary housing typically includes a number of molded support ribs and other contoured surfaces structured to resist the winding forces, but these features are difficult to incorporate into a mold. That is, as is known, a mold must be pulled apart over a single axis, e.g. the top mold must be lifted vertically off the lower mold. Thus, and again assuming the molds are separated vertically, it would be impossible to have a plurality of horizontal ribs as the mold that is moved could not pass the ribs. Thus, the unitary housing component may only have a number of vertically extending ribs or similar contoured surfaces. These features resist skewing of the unitary housing.
While use of a unitary housing reduces assembly costs, the creation of such molds is very expensive and the extensive contouring leads to many deformations in the molded parts. Further, the limited type of support ribs, e.g. no X-shaped trusses, means that a unitary housing is less capable of resisting winding stresses than a structure that does include more robust ribs. While this may not cause an instant failure, repeated stress causes the unitary housing component to wear out more quickly. Further, the functional contoured surfaces are not smooth and tend to be asymmetric. Such contouring is, generally, not considered to be as aesthetically pleasing as symmetrical flat sidewalls.